Deuteronomy 12:2, 3 "Ye shall utterly destroy all the places, wherein the nations which ye shall possess served their gods, upon the high mountains, and upon the hills, and under every green tree: And ye shall overthrow their altars, and break their pillars, and burn their groves with fire; and ye shall hew down the graven images of their gods, and destroy the names of them out of that place."
God instructed the Israelites when they took over a nation to completely destroy every pagan altar and idol in the land. Why did God want everything destroyed? Because he knew that the Israelite's beliefs could change if they started worshipping at the altars or the idols. So he didn’t want anything to remain which might tempt the Israelites to worship idols. In other words, the bad habits of the conquered nation were to be completely erased so that these same habits would not pass onto the Israelites. In the same way, we need to completely remove bad habits from our lives so that they don’t drag us down.
Habits are patterns of behavior that are regularly repeated and often occur without any conscious thought. Put another way, a habit is an activity that has been commenced by a person and then is done regularly or repeatedly, quite often as an automatic process and is found challenging to stop. When someone has this habitual behaviour they may not realize they are actually doing it. This is because it has become so routine in their life that it has become a sub-conscious activity.
We do not inherit habits from our parents but rather we learn them as we go through life. From the earliest years of our life we all have taken on habits. When we are child it might be sucking a thumb or biting finger nails. When we are older it maybe eating breakfast at a particular time each day, overspending at the shops or procrastination.
We can have good habits and bad habits. Some people describe themselves by listing their character traits and habits as though this is what they are and it can’t be changed. But we should always remember that habits do not control us but rather we control the habits. So good habits can be learned and bad habits unlearned.
Habits are a very strong influence in our lives. This is because they are consistent, frequently unconscious activities, that continually influence our behaviour. As a result, how effective or ineffective we are depends on these habits. The Bible does not mention habits as such, but it does talk about the behaviour which goes with habits.
We need to examine all the activities in our life to identify which are bad habits. Bad habits are anything which is seen as a negative behaviour or undesirable. Examples of bad habits are sexual immorality, smoking, excessive drinking of alcohol, taking of illegal drugs, gossiping, procrastination, impatience, criticalness, selfishness and so forth. For the follower of God, bad habits are anything that turn our hearts from God and lead us to doing wrong.
We need to look at the underlying cause of the bad habit whether it be an attitude we have, activity we do, a relationship we have with someone or a possession. Once we have identified it we then need to remove it or change it. This way the temptation is no longer there that turns our heart from God, leading us to do wrong.
God instructed the Israelites when they took over a nation to completely destroy every pagan altar and idol in the land. Why did God want everything destroyed? Because he knew that the Israelite's beliefs could change if they started worshipping at the altars or the idols. So he didn’t want anything to remain which might tempt the Israelites to worship idols. In other words, the bad habits of the conquered nation were to be completely erased so that these same habits would not pass onto the Israelites. In the same way, we need to completely remove bad habits from our lives so that they don’t drag us down.
Habits are patterns of behavior that are regularly repeated and often occur without any conscious thought. Put another way, a habit is an activity that has been commenced by a person and then is done regularly or repeatedly, quite often as an automatic process and is found challenging to stop. When someone has this habitual behaviour they may not realize they are actually doing it. This is because it has become so routine in their life that it has become a sub-conscious activity.
We do not inherit habits from our parents but rather we learn them as we go through life. From the earliest years of our life we all have taken on habits. When we are child it might be sucking a thumb or biting finger nails. When we are older it maybe eating breakfast at a particular time each day, overspending at the shops or procrastination.
We can have good habits and bad habits. Some people describe themselves by listing their character traits and habits as though this is what they are and it can’t be changed. But we should always remember that habits do not control us but rather we control the habits. So good habits can be learned and bad habits unlearned.
Habits are a very strong influence in our lives. This is because they are consistent, frequently unconscious activities, that continually influence our behaviour. As a result, how effective or ineffective we are depends on these habits. The Bible does not mention habits as such, but it does talk about the behaviour which goes with habits.
We need to examine all the activities in our life to identify which are bad habits. Bad habits are anything which is seen as a negative behaviour or undesirable. Examples of bad habits are sexual immorality, smoking, excessive drinking of alcohol, taking of illegal drugs, gossiping, procrastination, impatience, criticalness, selfishness and so forth. For the follower of God, bad habits are anything that turn our hearts from God and lead us to doing wrong.
We need to look at the underlying cause of the bad habit whether it be an attitude we have, activity we do, a relationship we have with someone or a possession. Once we have identified it we then need to remove it or change it. This way the temptation is no longer there that turns our heart from God, leading us to do wrong.
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